“Inside of three days them husbands are plumb anxious to go to their wives, but wifie has nailed the front door shut. Them there dancin’ lessons has improved us wonderful, Ike. I gets old Sam Holt to dance in your place.
“Then we finds out somethin’.
“Judge Steele goes sneakin’ around home late at night after our lessons, and he peeks under the curtains in his house, and he sees Miss Harrison teachin’ them womin to dance, and the judge swears that they ain’t got enough clothes on to flag a hand-car.
“The judge so forgets himself that he raps on the window, and he gets a lot of bird-shot sprayed into the seat of his pants.
“Miss Harrison has double-crossed us, and the next night we chides her about it. She gets kinda woolly and informs us that the ladies invited her to teach them so they could do their part in the performance. She was teachin’ ’em the ‘Dance of the Raindrops.’
“‘My ⸺!’ grunts Wick. ‘My wife ain’t no raindrop.’
“‘I ain’t goin’ to permit Mrs. Tilton to appear in no mosquito nettin’ and bare feet—not in public,’ declares Testament.
“Things got kinda deadlocked, Ike. The tickets are all sold for the performance, and the church realizes over two hundred dollars. Me and the judge goes as a committee to confer with Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Tilton, and they refuses to arbitrate. They opines that what’s good enough for their husbands is good enough for them. Mrs. Tilton says:
“If Testament can wear a gee-string and imitate a willer-tree, why can’t I wear a porous-knit undershirt and imitate a drop of rain?’
“What could we do? We went back and held a council of war. Pete said he’d be ⸺ if his wife was goin’ to be a spectacle. They all declared that they wasn’t goin’ to let the world at large gaze upon their property in the rough. Miss Harrison declares that it must go through. There yuh are, Ike.